SYLVESTER CHISHIMBA, Lusaka
THE national boxing team’s participation at next month’s Africa Boxing Championship in Cong-Brazzaville is in doubt following the Zambia Boxing Federation (ZBF)’s failure to raise K35,000 needed for the outing.

The tournament will run from June 17 to 25 in Brazzaville.
ZBF general secretary Bright Chomba said in an interview yesterday that the federation is struggling to raise the money needed for the team to travel to Brazzaville.
“As a federation we are appealing to corporate entities to come on board and help us raise the money needed for the boxers to compete at the tournament in Congo-Brazzaville. It will be unfair not to send the boxers who have spent time training for this competition,” he said.
Chomba said ZBF has selected nine boxers for the Brazzaville event.
The event in Brazzaville is a qualifying tournament for the 2017 World Boxing Championship billed for Hamburg, Germany.
“We also want to use this competition [Africa Championship] to prepare for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.We need to send the nine boxers for us to increase the chances of minting more medals at the tournament.
“We are still lobbying Government to come to our rescue,” he said.
The boxers in camp are Chishimbe Simoya, Emmanuel Ngoma, Nkumbu Silungwe, Ben Muziyo, Mbachi Kaonga, Alice Mbewe, Juliana Kasonka, Charles Lumbwe and Felistus Nkandu.